Different types of moveable barrier systems have been sold over the years and these systems have been used to control the movement of various types of moveable barriers. For example, garage door operators have been used to move garage doors and gate operators have been used to open and close gates. In another example, fire doors and shutters are closed when a fire occurs in order to contain a fire within a building or other structure.
Previous fire door and fire shutter systems were often configured so that they would naturally close due to the force of gravity. These previous approaches typically provided that the door closed when a fire occurred upon the release of some form of door holding mechanism. Some previous door holding mechanisms were controlled by cables that provided a link to the door and the link was constructed of a material that melted at high temperature. When the link melted, the door holding mechanism released the door and the door fell in a downward direction at a speed of decent controlled by a separate governor that was attached to the barrier.
Other previous fire door and fire shutter systems used a separate control apparatus to control the door release system. In some of these previous systems, this function was performed by a separate electronic device that released a cable (that was attached to the door), while in others of these previous systems, a separate magnetic apparatus released the barrier.
Unfortunately, in all of the above-mentioned previous systems the functions of holding the barrier, releasing the barrier, and controlling movement of the barrier (as the barrier moves in a downward direction) were implemented in separate complicated mechanisms or devices. The use of separate devices to provide each function increased the complexity of the system thereby increasing the maintenance costs and the overall cost of the system. These previous systems also became more difficult to operate as the number of parts and complexity of the individual parts increased.